Yes they are special. The coach is not special, but the players are. I saw Savard, Lemaire and Cournoyer at the forum live. They were magnificent.
I dream of a great french player for Habs again.
That is because you never sat in the corner at the forum at age 11 and saw Lafluer give a perfect pass to Lemaire, who then drilled it into top corner. The lights were incredibly bright, and everything was painted and new, in red, always.
Habs are in my blood. They are Montreal, french and english. I am objective on everything else in life, but with Habs I am not objective. I want them to win, every day.
I also saw those players live, and yes, they were most definitely special. But not because they were french. In fact, as a little kid I was totally unaware of which players spoke which language, nor did I care. I was lucky enough to watch Beliveau, my first hero, at the end of his career, thought Gump Worsley looked 50, loved Dick Duff's stickhandling and Cournoyer's speed, cringed when young Serge Savard crashed into a goalpost and broke his leg, and then, slightly older, I got to see Lafleur, Robinson, Shutt, Lemaire et al plenty of times at the Forum. Loved them all... up to the moment they opened their mouths. Nice guys, but boring. None of them spoke french or english -- put a microphone in front of them and they all became unilingual dronephones. Monotone assembly-line responses filled with cliches. Equally irrelevant in either language. Dryden was the exception. But did they fight and win for the bleu-blanc-rouge? If so, they spoke the only language that mattered.
Same thing today. Love the team, love the characters, love the compete, but not particularly interested in hearing another Petry "Y'know" or Markov "Umm...". Subban, of course, is today's exception. And the single worst interview has to be Therrien. For all the hoopla over a francophone coach, frankly, they're still looking for one. From Jacques Martin to Michel Therrien, Habs are still waiting to find a guy who can speak above a mumbly monotone. Having these gentlemen as our linguistic torch-holders seems the ultimate irony.
The other irony is this battle is being fought over something coach and players don't even want to do. Speaking to the media is their least favourite part of the job, plus they suck at it. Maybe the solution is to give players' names a local flavour (Pétry, Pacioretté, Gallaguerre) but never let them talk. Keep it a mystery. People can assume they speak whatever language they prefer and we'll never know for sure. We're happy, the players are thrilled, the coach can print his response after the game with the appropriate cliches ticked off -- win, win, win.